Intrepid digital news reporter with experience covering breaking, features, and enterprise stories. Experienced with social media content creation and management.
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Feature & Enterprise Stories
Inside the dramatic, multi-million dollar race for NYC dog mayor
Everything was going smoothly in New York City’s honorary dog mayor election until Ziggy the Yorkie mix and Bertram the Pomeranian matched up.
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Just before the polls closed, a “gigantic bomb of votes hit Twitter” for Bertram, a retired dog influencer known for his Paddington bear costume. Then, the voter fraud allegations came.
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"I don't recognize the results of this election," one constituent wrote on Instagram.
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It was not fraud but rather a “globally dispersed” online crypto community that had made Bertram the face of their new coin, giving him an unexpected boost in support. Bertram’s owner, Kathy Grayson, has no idea why.
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My story was the first report on the crypto drama related to the election, which was ultimately picked up by the New York Times.
Wegmans fish market is ‘confusingly similar’ to East Village sushi shop
A fish market owner sued Wegman’s in 2023 claiming the grocery store giant had ripped off its design and business model. I found the lawsuit using court records, interviewed the owner, and visited both businesses to get a sense of the similarity.
I was the first to report this story which was ultimately picked up by The New York Times, Grub Street, New York Post and more.
Goldman Sachs analyst vanishes from the Brooklyn Mirage
Two 27-year-old men went missing from the same music venue in Brooklyn just over a month apart. Both were found dead days later in Newtown Creek.
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I was the first to report this story which captured national attention for weeks. My stories spanned initial breaking news coverage of the second man going missing and interviews with family, friends, and elected officials. Most recently I wrote a year anniversary story.
Another man found dead in Newtown Creek: ‘Damani loved life’
A family is heartbroken after their loved one was found dead in Newtown Creek last month, the circumstances mirroring two similar deaths last summer in East Williamsburg.
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Damani Alexander, 30, went to a nearby venue, Knockdown Center, on July 28 before his body was found in the water of Newtown Creek two days later, according to his mother, Desiree Nicholson.
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​Little is known about Alexander’s final moments. The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has not yet determined his cause of death, and police are still investigating how and when he ended up in the creek, according to the NYPD.
Changing the city, 7 minutes at a time
Rain fell over Brooklyn as dozens of locals crowded into Awesome Home — as they have thrice monthly for years — on a March evening to laugh, cry, sing, debate and chat. They call it “7 7.”
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The idea is simple: seven performers get seven minutes in front of a microphone in venues across Prospect Lefferts Gardens on the 7th, 17th and 27th of every month.
Imagine it as a community board meeting, but there’s beer, it’s fun. It’s also one of the neighborhood's worst-kept, most beloved, secrets.
‘Bring Hugo home’: Locals fight for NYC business owners facing visa trouble
After many difficult years working toward a permanent visa, Hugo Pinto and his wife, Karah Rempe, were overjoyed when they set out from New York City to Honduras for his final interview.
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Little did they know he’d end up stuck there, away from their children and the couple’s shared business, Dutch Baby, waiting in a bureaucratic middle ground.
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Now, the timeline on Pinto’s case has been extended for at least another six months – and over 3,300 New Yorkers have stepped in to try to get their beloved neighbor back home.
She was shot outside her NYC school. A year later, her mom’s still fighting for justice
When a teenage girl found her sister bleeding outside their Williamsburg high school, their lives were forever changed – and it’s time for their school to “do the right thing,” the family’s lawyer, John Beatty, told PIX11 News on Thursday in an exclusive interview.
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The teenager, a National Honor Society student, was an innocent bystander shot in the leg outside Williamsburg Charter High School in February 2023, according to Beatty, who recently filed a lawsuit against the school on behalf of the family. Since the shooting, the road to recovery has been difficult, the girls’ mother said.
Eric Adams' historic indictment
I played a key role in PIX11's coverage of Mayor Eric Adams' historic indictment, fact-checking my colleagues' stories, preparing notes on the indictment, writing stories with information from field reporters, and coming up with original angles. Find a few of my stories below:
Child sex abuse lawsuits naming NYC doctor pour in ahead of deadline
Over 60 people have used a soon-expiring New York City law to allege they were sexually abused as children by Dr. Reginald Archibald, adding to a mountain of accusations against the late doctor.
Six lawsuits were filed in New York City in February using a 2022 New York City amendment to the Gender-Motivated Violence Act that briefly lifted the nine-year filing window for cases involving sexual violence, domestic violence, human trafficking and more.
Where has Sherita gone? A Brooklyn icon erased
A mysterious Bed-Stuy icon painted on an Atlantic Avenue billboard was recently covered up, renewing a decade-old question: Who is Sherita?
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The “fabulous” pink dinosaur-looking figure once loomed over a tire shop at Classon Avenue on a billboard that read “Attention landlords, our fuel oil price is right. Come in now!” Her disappearance this week, much like the mystery of her origins, has perplexed hundreds of New Yorkers.
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“As she moves on to the great oil rig in the sky… she will remain in our hearts,” local Mike McCabe, who made a short film inspired by the mysterious dinosaur years ago, told PIX11 News on Wednesday.
'Years Of Neglect,' Fire Spark Crown Heights Rent Strike: Tenants
Elana Rinsler woke up Feb. 7 like she had any other morning, but her bleary eyes quickly spotted danger: smoke billowing from her apartment's floor.
She grabbed her two dogs and ran.
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Hours after firefighters put out the blaze that devastated her home of 12 years, Rinsler sat amid the wreckage and waited for someone from her building's management company, Hager Management, to even "pretend to care" about her well-being, she said.
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She's still waiting. Hager's representatives sent her off with no financial support or guidance, she said.
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"We literally were made homeless," Rinsler said. "It's been terrible, it's been a lot."
Documented LAPD Violence Against Reporters Triggers Investigation
Tina-Desiree Berg was looking for a better camera angle to film a nearby arrest at Friday's abortion rights demonstration when she was hit in the head by an officer, video from the scene shows. She grabbed a railing to break her fall when another officer came in and threw her to the ground.
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“You’ve got to learn,” the Los Angeles police officer tells Berg after she stands back up to show him the big, bright yellow press badge that was already hanging around her neck.
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She had made an effort to stay a safe distance from the arrest, staying mostly by a railing on the sidewalk.
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“We’re trying to protect you,” he tells her as onlookers continue to scream, "she’s a journalist!"
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Brooklyn Planet-Gazers Line Up Around Block For Glimpse Of Saturn
A video went viral on TikTok of hundreds of Brooklynites lined up in the street to look through Joe Delfausse's telescope. I interviewed him and a woman who had waited in line for a glimpse of Saturn about the serendipitous night in Park Slope.
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A year later, I did an interview with Delfausse and other ameteur astronomers about the solar eclipse.
Locals Fight To Save Brooklyn Church From Becoming Luxury Housing
When the Metropolitan New York Synod Council tried to sell a historic Greenpoint church to developers with plans to build luxury housing, locals attempted an ambitious form of collective investment to save the community space.
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My first story about the beloved church centered on a hearing with the judge presiding over the sale, during which locals outlined the building's huge value for community building. My second story looked at the attempt to turn the church into a collectively owned community center.
‘It takes a village’: locals eye parks, school improvements in wake of budget cuts
New York City residents now have a chance to spend $1 million in city funds locally, and many have taken aim at parks and schools under the hum of contentious budget cuts that leaders say threaten the agencies’ operations.
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Participatory budgeting ballots opened across 24 City Council districts on Saturday, allowing all residents over the age of 11 to vote on how $1 million should be spent in their neighborhoods.
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“This is a way where our communities are making it very clear they care,” said City Council Member and Parks Chair Shekar Krishnan. “It is such an organic reflection of what we value as New Yorkers.”
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Much-needed repairs for parks and schools dominate the districts’ ballots. Across just five of the participating ballots, 37 out of 44 projects are dedicated to schools and parks.